The Space Between
by TASAKAPEOTKAUU
Summary: Harry PotterLotR. Four witches execute a plan and get more than they bargained for. A lot more.
1. The Ludicrous Plan

Disclaimer: I don't own anything that could possibly get me rich and famous.  
  
Authors note: This is a last ditch effort to actually start and finish a story. I got smart this time and asked my friends to help me with this one. If you like the story and I start to lag behind please badger me until I start again. If you don't like the story please don't flame it. I can take polite constructive criticism because I'm always looking to improve by flames just make me angry.  
  
Chapter 1: The Ludicrous Plan  
  
Foreign exchange programs look good on everyone's papers, even in the wizarding world. With that in mind Michele, Lisa, Leah, and Rachel opted to spend their last year of magical education in Scotland attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. At least that's why they told their parents they were going there.  
  
In reality they were planning to try something that the Ministry of Magic had forbidden back in the time of Uric the Oddball, Dimension hopping.  
  
Dimension hopping had been outlawed on the grounds that if someone could splinch themselves going from point A and to point B in this dimension, what would happen to them if they went from point A in this dimension to point B in that one?... Ouch... and there is the gruesome fate of Uric the Oddball. Stop by the Museum of the Supernatural located in Abanasia to view the magically preserved upper half of Uric's corpse.  
  
The girls weren't planning on Apparating to Middle Earth however. They were planning on transporting themselves there from a point of sufficient mystical convergence with a spell and a few choice reference items. Since none of them were stupid enough to test their theory themselves they'd found a guinea pig.  
  
"Yeah, that's what I heard." Leah said leaning in closer to her three friends. "The professors have been trying to hush up the whole thing but I of course the Gryffindors know. I heard a group of them talking about it in the library."  
  
Rachel leaned forward and whispered, "So it worked," She looked around nervously expecting someone to pop up and scream 'Ahh hah', at any moment, "the spell worked?"  
  
Michele nodded. "Cool huh? I tailed Sinestra and Flitwick on my way to Potions. They were talking, well whispering, about it, but at one point I did manage to hear Sinestra cry out about an Alternate Brazil. It seems our dear Professor Trelawney spent two years there when it was only the three days here." Michele smirked and waited for her laughing companions to quiet down before continuing. "We're still in the clear though, they don't have a clue who's responsible. Plus, Flitwick said the spell was brilliant, his exact words were 'far too advanced for a mere student'" Michele had screwed up her face in order to do a bad imitation of Flitwick's squeaky voice and then broke out into a self-congratulatory grin. "I'm brilliant, so... bow to me!"  
  
Lisa quirked an eyebrow at her, "Ya ya, you're the best. Now, when are we leaving, and is the spell ready?" At Lisa's oh so eloquent words all eyes were again trained on Michele.  
  
She looked as if she had just been asked what time it was...in Chinese. "Uhhhhhh....—"  
  
"Yup she's brilliant alright" Leah giggled to Rachel, who was starting to laugh herself. Both of them received a mock glare from the insulted party which resulted in all four of them giggling, until they picked up on the curious glances they were receiving from the other occupants of the Great Hall.  
  
"Yes, the spell is ready. I just need the book, and did we decide on the watch to signify time, because if not I'll have to rewrite that part." She looked as if she'd murder any who'd dare cause her to spend any more time on the spell. It's unsurprising that she received nods from all three of her friends. "Good. As to when we're going... Leah, Rachel, and I discussed it while you were in Arithmacy. We decided that it would be best if we left tomorrow night after curfew. We'll have to avoid Snape and Filch and his damn cat but that should be easy. I mean you've been preparing potions for this scheme since we got here and that was like months ago."  
  
"Yeah we can all just down one of your invisibility drafts." said Leah. "Or we could accio Potter's invisibility cloak. I mean who does he think he's kidding sneaking around at all hours of the night? He's creeping around the castle hiding under a blanket for crying out loud. Everyone knows he does it, he might as well leave the cloak behind for all the good it does."  
  
Lisa had been nodding towards the end of what Michele was saying, but when Leah went off on her 'Harry Potter is such an ass' speech decided her efforts were better spent giving Leah incredulous looks. "Ooookay, back to the actual topic. I agree. Tomorrow night is definitely the best choice; it'll give us time to write to our parents. I haven't written to my mother in a while and even though I don't converse with her often, if I wait much longer she'll start to wonder. Better to lay aside their suspicions before they form." The last three words were hard to understand because she said them while yawning.  
  
"It's getting late and if we're going to do this we're gonna want to do it without getting caught. Dumbledore knows everything that goes on in this castle so I have a feeling he knows we're up to something. So, I propose we make sure we have everything we want to take with us packed tonight. Michele sand Lisa stocked the tent's pantry with enough food to last for like a year," Rachel smirked at the two aforementioned persons, "so that's not a problem, and we all have at least six changes of clothes, but we should all bring our Intensive Magical Care books. We'll almost certainly need then for what we have planned. I grabbed our brooms and put them in the tent's first closet already. I can't believe we're actually going to do this. We should send our letters in the morning because we don't want to risk getting caught going to the owlry tonight. Are we bringing out pets?" This last was said with extreme exasperation at finding something else they had to talk about before they could go to bed.  
  
"I'm not leaving Kismet by himself. When we come back we wouldn't have a place to stay. I mean you know him, he's destructo kitty." Michele sputtered about her white jaguar. "Besides, if we get into trouble with people when we first get there we're not going to want to use magic. We've all read the Lord of the Rings and the only reference to witches they have in there is the Witch King. He's one of the bad guys. If we tell the good guys that we're witches they'll automatically jump to conclusions. The entire purpose of this journey is to see if we can change things without altering the outcome of their quest, I don't want die before we can do that." Michele ranted. She's very good at ranting. "Our cats will protect us."  
  
Lisa sighed in relief. "Good because I didn't want to leave Shroud behind. I know I wanted a Black Panther forever but now that I have one it's annoyingly hard to go anywhere without him. I mean he's like a freakin' dog, he begs, and when I say no he practically bites my head off."  
  
At the end of their conversation on what needed to be done, Rachel and Leah decided that they wanted to take their cats with them too. Rachel had dark grey Leopard named Gloom and Leah had a White Tiger named Blizzah. They all went off to their common room and then to their rooms, to pack and compose their letters. In the morning operation 'act normal and try not to get caught' would begin. 


	2. Let Us Be Delivered

Disclaimer: I only own my plot, well it's mostly original. There's only so much originality you can get when there are like a million different versions of the Harry Potter/ LoTR idea floating around. I'm the only one with a 'Get to Middle Earth through the Room of Requirement' plot though. I checked. So ha! I own Kismet, Gloom, Blizzah, and Shroud and my friends own themselves, except Leah. I own her soul. She gave it to me for a piece of bubble gum. I'm gonna make this disclaimer for infinity though because I hate these things. Oh and J.R.R. Tolkien owns all things LoTR and J.K. Rowling owns all things Harry Potter.  
  
Now on to the story!  
  
Chapter 2: Let us be delivered  
  
"Ouch, you stepped on my foot again!" Rachel gritted out. All four of the girls had been trodden upon or stumbled into on their way to their destination. So far they'd avoided Mrs. Norris, Filches cat, and the bane of every student in the school, Professor Snape. At one point they'd had to physically restrain Lisa, (This was damn hard to do with four very large, invisible cats. Four invisible cats, which they'd had to attach to leashes.) because she had this thing for messing with Snape.  
  
"Well sooooorrrrry, I wouldn't keep bumping into you if I could see you. You'd think that because we're all invisible we'd be able to see each other." An invisible Michele turned and glared in the direction she believed Lisa to be in, then remembered that the effect was lost since no one could see it. So she concentrated on putting all of the frustration she was feeling into her voice instead. "Lisa next time you design and make an invisibility potion, make sure that when we take it we can see other invisible people. Like us."  
  
A breathy sigh came from somewhere to the right, "Agreed." The others all turned in the direction of Lisa's voice with gaping mouths. They didn't know it, but they all mirrored each other perfectly in that second. If they had known, each would have immediately adopted a different expression, but this was just a gape worthy moment. Lisa hadn't made a single sarcastic remark at the criticism. It was unheard of.  
  
"Agreed? That's it? No scathing remark, no outraged cry, just agreed? Wow, that's a first. You didn't happen to hit your head on a blunt obje—" Leah was cut off by a quick 'sssshhhhhh' from Rachel because they had arrived. They were in front of the concealed door to the Room of Requirement. It was the only place in the school they'd been able to find with enough pure mystical energy to allow the spell to transport all four of them at the same time. Going two by two was out of the question. They couldn't risk being split up in an alternate dimension even if they all knew the exact time and place they were aiming for.  
  
"So, who wants to open it?" Michele asked. She hadn't been paying attention when Rachel had explained to the group how it worked. She was hoping that the others didn't detect the uncertainty in her voice and tell her that she could have the honors. It wouldn't be the first time something like that had happened. Luckily, God didn't hate her that much today.  
  
"I'll do it." Rachel said, "We'd never get it open if I left it to you guys. Not a one of you paid attention to a single thing I was saying when I explained what had to be done. Lisa was paying more attention to her painting her nails, Leah, you were so bored you transfigured Lisa's nail polish into an elastic hair band and started snapping Michele over and over with it, but Michele, you didn't feel it because you were too deeply engrossed into one of your smutty novels to care!" If she had been able to see them Rachel would have seen her friends do a variety of things in the aftermath of what she had said. Leah rolled her eyes and stuck her tongue out at her. Lisa gave her the English version of the bird and Michele went about finding a way to allow Rachel to see her rating of her performance. In case you were wondering it was a 6.3.  
  
Two minutes later they were inside the room, with the door closing behind them with a soft 'snick'. Rachel went about setting up a large pentagram with five cylindrical red candles. Lisa handed out the invisibility reversal potion after having a fun time finding them. Michele did a final silent read through of the potion to make sure she didn't stumble through any part of the spell and Leah separated the few spell components they'd need to make this work.  
  
With one last lingering glance on their surroundings, each of the girls took their places in the pentagram. "Here we go." Rachel muttered. She had acted the most opposed to doing this, but in reality she was excited. She was beyond excited, and when they started the spell in perfect unity, she ceased to think, ceased to doubt, they were meant to do this.  
  
Through courage and faith,  
Through Time and Space,  
Let us be delivered.  
  
(Burns herbs)  
  
Through time of shadow,  
Through time of pain,  
Through toil and sorrow,  
Let us be delivered.  
  
(Smashes bottle full of tears where herbs lay smoldering)  
  
Through twist of fate,  
In a world not our own,  
Let no harm be done to us,  
Let the battle be won to us,  
Let us be delivered.  
  
(Throws LoTR trilogy to the ground)  
  
Middle Earth calls,  
And we will answer.  
As we will it,  
So mote it be.  
  
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *  
  
Headmaster Albus Dumbledore was sitting in his office politely conversing with the portraits of the headmasters and headmistresses that came before him, when the blast of power hit the castle. The aftermath of the spell was stifling; it was like a metaphysical hydrogen bomb went off in the middle of the school and all he could think was 'it's about time'.  
  
For years he'd waited for the four girls that would fulfill the second and last prophecy he'd ever made. The prophesy that dealt with a world who's turmoil was even greater than that of their own. It was too bad they'd had to leave; they were destined for great things. They could have been valuable in the fight against Lord Voldemort. Oh well.  
  
In the mean time he had a magical clean up crew to assemble. He knew he should have had the Room moved to the outside of the school. The last thought he had before the pure magic in the air battered down his mental shields was: I hope their world can survive the coming of the four greatest witches of our time. 


	3. Pond Sludge

Disclaimer: I only own my plot, the cats, and any other characters you don't know. Bladity blah blah.

Note: Sorry I took so long to update but I lost interest for a while. That seems to happen a lot. Then I was looking at my file for the first time in like half a year and saw that I had new reviews and that they were positive ones at that. Thank you people for helping me get out of my funk. I will try to make irregular, though faster than the last one, installments, and if I get into a rhythm I'll also attempt to get back into my HP/ Outsiders story. Wish me luck and please keep reviewing me because you have now idea how much those positive reviews brightened my day. You all rock!

Chapter 3: Pond Sludge

There is only one-way to describe traveling through space and time: sickening. It's like being attacked by a miasma of colors and indescribable extremes while gravity is trying to pull you in every direction at once. If wasn't bad enough, just when it became accepted that the feeling would never stop, it did. Now, you would think that this would be a good thing, but alas…no. Not when you're spit out of a dimensional vortex, a rip in the fabric of reality, nearly a hundred feet above a muck covered pond, and then gravity decides to make up its mind and you plunge into cold, and might I add gross, water.

"If we were Wiccan, we might actually believe this was our fault." Spat Michele, surfacing in the tepid water with a rather large amount of goo on her head, latching onto Kismet, her now very dirty kitty. The other cats were already making their way to the rocky shore. "I mean this is a perfect example of karma backfiring and that stupid rule of 'anything-you-do-will-come-back-to-you-times-three' crap they dish out."

"Then it's a good thing we're not Wiccans, isn't it?" replied Leah who was equally covered in the 'diarrheal baby poop' colored pond muck; a little put out that Blizzah had just up and left her there. "Traitor!" She hissed at him getting only a drowsy look and kitty sneeze in her direction.

Lisa said nothing choosing instead to alternately glare at Shroud for his abandoning of her to the pond muck and then glaring at the disgusting substance itself.

Rachel had the worst luck of them all. She appeared to have swallowed some of the ooze and was attempting to cough it up…with minimal success. "Ugghh, gross! This tastes like one of Lisa's experiments," she said in a stage whisper to Leah and Michele. Then under her breath she added, "One of her better ones." Unfortunately for her, her under her breath abilities were not at their best after inhaling the stagnant water.

Lisa, having heard that last part, picked up one of her boots, which was floating in front of her, having come of some time in the process of falling or surfacing, and lobbed it at Rachel's head. She missed spectacularly and the shoe landed a good ten feet behind Rachel and quite a bit to the left, resulting in a masculine grunt of pain and…a masculine grunt of pain?

All four girls turned as if one, in the direction of the noise only to find themselves being watched by the very people that they had come to find. The only problem was, from the look of their surroundings, this was neither where nor when they were supposed to find them.

An awkward silence settled as the two groups; one consisting of four soaked witches, the other of nine strangers, stared in helpless silence and disbelief at one another. The silence on both sides could be attributed to shock and it didn't seem that anyone was going to break it. Then again, if you had just seen four girls and their strange beasts plummet from a Technicolor rift in the sky you'd probably be speechless too.

Unfortunately for both of the groups the monster that had previously been slumbering under the water's depths had been roused from its monotonous existence by the abrupt arrival of the girls and chose this time to make its presence known. It propelled itself to the surface with all the blundering grace of someone on a broomstick for the first time and extended its huge mass of tentacles towards the first living being it came into contact with… which, wouldn't you know it, was still Frodo.

The longer tentacles had whipped over the heads of the girls and made a bee line straight for the unfortunate little hobbit; so either Frodo was just REALLY unlucky or the Watcher in the water could sense that he was carrying the One Ring. Oh goody.

The attack produced somewhat positive results however, as both groups were jogged out of their inaction and back into their senses.

Michele, realizing that she and her friends were still in a massive amount of danger due to them having never actually removed themselves from the lake, quickly put up a rough magical barrier that would hold long enough to allow them all to reach the shoreline. Once there they would then be able to join the Fellowship, for that was the other group, in freeing Frodo. It wouldn't do anyone any good if they were all killed before their little journey ever began and they certainly couldn't help Frodo if they didn't save themselves first.

With that sentiment it mind Rachel led the others towards the shore, skillfully weaving between, under, and around the waving tentacles, as well as those fighting to free their captured friend. When they had climbed a suitable distance up the rocky beach, they turned back to watch the fight.

Quickly taking stock of the situation, Michele yelled to her friends, over the sounds of the battle, to start firing stunning spells at the monster. They immediately turned their wands at the creature's base and at the waving limbs that were still wrapped around the unlucky hobbit, and none of them had to look to know that while they were bombarding the monster with spells Michele was raising a more permanent magical shield to protect the one that they were freeing and the humans hacking at the monster with swords back in the lake.

Calls of "Stupefy!" rang out with barely a pause in between as both sides went about their task with serious faces; not even Lisa daring to make a smart remark about "size" of the creature's appendages, which was really unheard of.

They were using stunning spells to ensure that they didn't harm the very ones they were trying to protect but it was slower. Using eviscerating spells would have been faster but they'd kick themselves if they misfired and ended up with "steaming pile o'hobbit". Seconds later their persistence paid off and Frodo fell from the Watcher's limp tentacles into one of the waiting human's arms. None of the girls could tell for sure whether it was Boromir or Aragorn, but whoever he was he flashed them a grateful look before ducking into the still-open doors of the Mines of Moria with the rest of the Fellowship.

Sharing one last meaningful glance that clearly relayed their frustration of the situation to one another, the four witches called for their cats to follow them and followed the Fellowship into the mine.

Barely a few seconds later, the Watcher shrugged off the last of the effects of the stunning spells and waddled its way to the mine doors. That in itself was enough to paint a picture of just how powerful the creature really was. It usually took at least a few minutes for anything to recover from the sheer amount of stunning spells that it had been hit with. The spell itself was not very powerful as spells go, but even the weakest spell had lasting effects when repeatedly striking the same target without reprieve.

When the giant squid-like creature reached the doors and couldn't locate the chewy humanoid center it flew into a rage and tried to rip the roof off of the cave by tearing off the doors. It only half worked; the doors came off, but instead of revealing its prey, the roof of the entrance collapsed, ironically saving the beings trapped within.

Once the dust had mostly cleared on the other side of the cave-in, a soft word was spoken and a softly glowing light penetrated the darkness… leaving the two groups in much the same state they were in immediately prior to the monster's attack; they were still wet and they were still staring. The stare held very little suspicion on the Fellowships' part now, that particular emotion having been smothered somewhat when the girls had helped them fend off the creature, instead conveying a sense of curiosity at who about who they were and how their presence would effect their quest.

Just when the girls were starting to believe that they were going to have to take the initiative and break the silence themselves, Gandalf, for it could have been no other, heaved a great sigh and directed a look at them that was very reminiscent to the one that Dumbledore used on those students that were unfortunate enough to be caught doing something that they really weren't supposed to be doing; a look that these four girls were rather familiar with. "Well my dears," he began, that eerily familiar twinkle in his eyes, "you're late."


End file.
